#157: Finding a good therapist is hard but a recent episode of Netflix’s Atypical nailed the experience. We talk about what a “good” therapist is, how to find one, our own experiences, and other media examples of therapy.
I’ve mentioned many times in the past my idea of a “WTF Mental Health” podcast and inadvertently tried to address 5 or 6 topics from that idea here and I think I left most of them up in the air without addressing them properly. I blame Ali for always interrupting me.
Here’s the trailer for Seeso’s Shrink. You can also watch the first episode on youtube, or the whole season on NBC. There’s a lot of really funny people in this show <3
I gotta say, I absolutely loved Lauren’s line about always being a student and always having questions. That is something that reverberates with me greatly. I always love learning about new things when I can and I would listen to a speech about a lot of things if I had the free time.
I’ve had a really lucky experience with therapists. I’ve only ever had the one and she was exactly the kind of therapist I needed. She helped me get a lot of terminology and other concepts solidified in my mind that were able to help me figure out how to handle my anxiety and other issues as they popped up. I wouldn’t say I’ve exactly “conquered” my anxiety but with her help and the couple of classes I’ve had, I’ve got it much more under control than I had before. It’s much less crippling than it used to be and I’ve had a couple of little epiphanies that I’m trying to put into my everyday life more.
So the idea was a series that addressed misconceptions about mental health, especially treatment. In the U.S. in particular it is very confusing. The last time I seriously considered I wasn’t thinking in terms of projects vs ongoing shows sonit may still happen someday, who knows.
One thing I regret not saying in this episode is that despite everything we talked about, a therapist that meets none of our requirements for being a “good” therapist may still be helpful. For multiple reasons. One is what Ali said about the relationship mattering more than anything else. Another is that just focusing on the problem/solution is more beneficial than not thinking about it. And finally, the fact that people tend to get better and/or improve over time (regression to the mean), without intervention anyway.
As mentioned in my previous comment, there was a lot I wanted to address and I did not plan this well.
Awesome, id love to do a series that deals with the history of mental health and the history of mental health diagnoses, focusing its ethics and sociology and all the weird sociopolitical ideas that go into writting up diagnoses in the DSM.
